Million Book Collection - The Fishers of Men Ministries

THE NEOPLATONIC PHILOSOPHY AND EPOCH 285and requires no special working of the will upon itself,no further inward process, to bring it about. Thesensuous inclination may prove an impediment to thesoul's natural activity. As soon as this is removed,the soul pursues its course to that which is above thesenses as surely and directly as a balloon mounts intothe' air when the ropes binding it down are cut. Thusthe notion of purification understood as a deliverancefrom the body forms the basis of this moral system.That, at least, is the negative side; the positive is,that conversion to the invisible world, that becominglike to God, which follows immediately from it. Asthe soul's badness consists in its mixture with thebody, and its dependence on the body, its goodnesscan only consist in its detaching itself from the body,and working for itself alone. All virtues are nothingmore than a purifying, and this purifying does nottouch the soul as such, which in itself has no stain,but only its relation to the body. Accordingly, thebecoming like to God is contained in the purifying.As soon as the impure elements are removed, thsoul appears again in its original being. As thptor only needs to cut away a portion of thmarble to bring out the divine image, so the maworking upon himself only needs to remove thsuperfluity in order to stand revealed in his pure beauty.Nor only this, but at the same time he will seethe Divine above him, for kith only can discern kin.On which Plotinus 1 remarks, " For never did eye gazeon the sun without being of sun-like nature, nor thel behold beautv. *J without already *l being O beautifulAll moral activity, then, in its last resort, leads bthe delivery of the soul from the body.1 Ennead, i. 6, 9. Quoted by Zeller.